Jay, a homeless man sleeping near a Hollywood freeway onramp, awoke to the voices of police Friday morning. Los Angeles Police Department officers Julie Nony and Paula Davidson had rooted out an encampment of nine transients — including Jay — who were sleeping along the Highland Avenue onramp to Highway 101. Nony and Davidson were part of a team of roughly two dozen officers and sheriff's deputies who fanned out across Hollywood, trudging...

Question: How do I tip the people who take me by wheelchair for airline departures? Does the amount differ if it's a tiny, easy airport like Long Beach; medium to normal like SFO; or long, complicated and very hard like Dulles? I'd appreciate advice. Margo Kasdan Seal Beach Answer: Duck for cover. We're about to poke the hornet's nest again, creating yet another swarm of pro- and anti-gratuity camps, who have presumably been beefing since the word "gratuity" was first used in 1540, according to Merriam-Webster.

Officials are easing up on a controversial policy to keep homeless people from congregating and sleeping in Los Angeles' historic Union Station, reopening 30% of the terminal seating to the general public, a transportation official said Thursday. Seating in the waiting room had been placed off-limits in December to all but ticketed Amtrak and Metrolink passengers after hundreds of homeless people sought refuge in the cavernous Art Moderne lobby over the fall and early winter.

In a break with the city's earlier confrontational stance, Los Angeles' chief administrative officer Monday proposed a $3.7-million skid row cleanup program that would increase 24-hour bathroom access for homeless people and expand storage for their belongings. The proposal, which must be approved by the City Council, calls for setting aside part of a skid row parking lot where homeless people can check their shopping carts and small bins for the day. The plan would also expand a seven-day storage operation by 500 bins, and move a 90-day storage facility east of Alameda Street into the heart of skid row. The increased round-the-clock bathroom access would be funded by the city at existing skid row shelters and social service agencies.

When a civil rights group sued three of Southern California's wealthiest coastal cities last year, alleging police harassment of the homeless, the howls of indignation were swift and loud. Santa Monica city officials pointed to a long record of helping the destitute along its world-famous shoreline, including extensive social programs and a new and innovative homeless community court. Santa Barbara has a year-round homeless shelter and allows those down on their luck to sleep in city-designated parking lots, a program being replicated by other municipalities.

The city of Los Angeles is dropping an appeal of a court ruling banning the seizure and destruction of property that homeless people leave unattended on public sidewalks, Rob Wilcox, spokesman for City Atty. Mike Feuer, said Monday. Feuer's decision ends three years of legal wrangling over health and safety on skid row. Eight skid row residents filed suit in 2011, accusing city workers, accompanied by police, of confiscating and dumping their personal possessions -- medication, identification, cellphones and toiletries.

A man was in custody late Friday in connection with the stabbings of three transients while they slept. The attacker left behind rambling "death warrants. " Los Angeles police Cmdr. Andrew Smith said Courtney Anthony Robinson was taken into custody shortly after 9 p.m. by an LAPD Hollywood gang officer. He has since been turned over to robbery-homicide detectives, Smith said. The detectives will question Robinson overnight, Smith said, adding that it's "unknown if he will be booked for the attempted murders at this time.

I was both pleased and dismayed by the article, "Homeless Languish in Liberal Laguna Beach," by Robert Schwartz (Jan. 30). The article was enlightening because it was about homeless people, who have been a long-neglected segment of our society. I was distressed because the article did not deal with the complexities of people being without a place of residence. The Episcopal Service Alliance has had to deal with misunderstandings about the homeless. For many reasons we had to close Martha House in Santa Ana in 1984.

Los Angeles and other cities are barred by the U.S. Constitution from randomly seizing and destroying property homeless people temporarily leave unattended on city streets, a federal appeals court decided Wednesday. Upholding a court order against Los Angeles, a panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled, 2-1, that the personal possessions the homeless leave for a short time on city sidewalks may be taken only if the possessions pose an immediate threat to public safety or health or constitute criminal evidence.

September 3, 2010 | By Lisa Girion and Scott Glover, Los Angeles Times

A Los Angeles physician was arrested Thursday for allegedly prescribing pain medication to homeless people who didn't need the drugs, according to records and authorities. Dr. Zhiwei Lin is set to be arraigned Friday on five counts of illegally prescribing drugs, misdemeanors each punishable by up to a year in County Jail and a $20,000 fine, according to the arrest warrant filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court. Lin, 52, a board-certified neurologist, declined to comment.

Addressing several lingering skid row conflicts, a top Los Angeles city budget official Monday proposed a $3.7-million cleanup plan that would increase 24-hour bathroom access for homeless people and expand storage for their belongings. The proposal, which must be approved by the City Council, calls for setting up a skid row parking lot where homeless people could check in their shopping carts for the day. The plan would also increase an existing short-term storage operation by 500 bins, from 1,136 to 1,636, and move a 90-day storage facility east of Alameda Street into the heart of skid row. The round-the-clock bathroom access would be provided at skid row shelters and social service agencies under contract to the city.

Turning the Cecil Hotel into homeless housing was supposed to be a quick and innovative way to get skid row residents off the streets. But a proposal for hundreds of homeless units in the hotel collapsed recently in the face of opposition from downtown business leaders and social service providers, backed by Los Angeles County Supervisor Gloria Molina. They argued the neighborhood is oversaturated with homeless housing and other services. "Supervisor Molina's strong opinion is that the skid row area is the way it is because of an over-concentration of services," Roxane Marquez, Molina's press deputy, said Friday.

The city of Los Angeles is dropping an appeal of a court ruling banning the seizure and destruction of property that homeless people leave unattended on public sidewalks, Rob Wilcox, spokesman for City Atty. Mike Feuer, said Monday. Feuer's decision ends three years of legal wrangling over health and safety on skid row. Eight skid row residents filed suit in 2011, accusing city workers, accompanied by police, of confiscating and dumping their personal possessions -- medication, identification, cellphones and toiletries.

The city of Lancaster is the end of the line for Metrolink commuter trains northbound from Los Angeles and Glendale. So when the homeless count in the Antelope Valley quadrupled, officials suspected that someone in Los Angeles was engaging in a railway version of "Greyhound therapy," putting transients on the train to whisk them away. "We've had people getting off the train with all their worldly possessions on them," said Lee D'Errico, the head of Lancaster's public safety department.

The city of Los Angeles must pay $700,000 to lawyers for skid row homeless people who successfully challenged a ban on sleeping in the streets, a federal appeals court has ruled. The lawyers offered a year ago to settle for a fraction of that amount, said civil rights attorney Carol Sobel, who was on the legal team for the homeless people. Mayor Eric Garcetti, then a councilman, and other council members present for the December 2012 vote rejected...

Officials are easing up on a controversial policy to keep homeless people from congregating and sleeping in Los Angeles' historic Union Station, reopening 30% of the terminal seating to the general public, a transportation official said Thursday. Seating in the waiting room had been placed off-limits in December to all but ticketed Amtrak and Metrolink passengers after hundreds of homeless people sought refuge in the cavernous Art Moderne lobby over the fall and early winter.

When the Rev. Wiley S. Drake goes on trial this week on criminal misdemeanor charges of housing homeless people without a permit, the issue will be no less than religious freedom, he says. For the city of Buena Park, the issue is his alleged defiance of municipal laws.

Homeless people trying to stay warm accidentally set fire to an abandoned warehouse today, causing a huge blaze that destroyed the building and a neighboring business complex, authorities said. The block-long complex housed about 50 businesses, including a recording studio, a video production company, a photography studio and a graphic arts office. "We lost everything," said Michael Wells, who worked for Diamond in the Ruff, the video production company. "We were all small businesses.

Some Venice activists have ended their years-long legal battle to restrict overnight parking in the coastal community, which has struggled over how to deal with people living in campers and cars. After Los Angeles Councilman Mike Bonin's office declined to support the restriction effort, an attorney representing the Venice Stakeholders Assn. said the group dropped a suit seeking "overnight parking districts" near the beach. The case was filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court in 2009, when the California Coastal Commission denied the city's application for restricted parking on the grounds that it would impede public access to Venice Beach between 2 a.m. and 5 a.m. The city joined the Venice Stakeholders suit but withdrew last year after the coastal agency denied overnight parking districts for a third time.

PLACERVILLE, Calif. - At Hangtown Haven, Wednesdays were family night, and on movie night 30 to 40 residents watched DVDs on a mammoth outdoor TV. Residents nursed one another through drug and alcohol detoxification and helped heart and stroke patients recover in their tents. The mayor championed the endeavor, churches embraced it and one police chief said it brought down crime. But on Friday, what is believed to be California's only authorized, self-governing campground for homeless people shut down.